The vice-president of 360Buy, one of China’s leading B2C e-commerce sites, has said that it is currently testing out an e-book service that will launch later this year. Shi Tao claims that 80,000 titles will be ready upon its public debut, and will stock 300,000 e-books by the end of the year.

360Buy’s most direct rival, Dangdang launched its own e-book platform– a section on its site, plus mobile apps for iPhone and Android – a few weeks ago. It debuted with 50,000 titles, and will presumably expand its library by the end of the year as well. Plus,Dangdang has an upcoming e-reader of its own – in the manner of Amazon with its Kindle – which will launch in a few months’ time.

Our customers are used to e-commerce, and many registered book buyers purchase books and videos at least twice a month.

And so he feels that now’s the time to start the transition to e-books, as more people in China get into the swing of paying for digital content – and an increasing number have smartphones on which to read e-books.